If you’ve ever booked a hotel, you will no doubt have looked at the quality and tried to get the hotel with the highest star rating that is still within your budget. However, have you ever experienced that a 3-star hotel is better than one with 5 stars? Or that one 3-star is totally different from the other 3-stars?
We all know that stars (in most cases!) Are used to indicate the level of service and facilities of a hotel (where one star will represent a rather limited accommodation and 5 stars will indicate that it is all excellent), but what you probably don’t know is that there is no global star rating system. So it all depends on the country you are staying in, in which region your hotel is located and what rating system is used to rate your hotel. In addition, star assignments can vary from website to website and from travel agent to travel agent – just to give you an idea of how confusing it can be.
Are there any rules at all?
In the UK for example, the responsibility for the star rating lies with the Automobile Association or AA for short, which is a kind of ANWB. However, there are also national tourist agencies such as VisitEngland, the Scottish Tourist Board, Visit Wales and the Northern Irish Tourist Board. In the US, the so-called AAA Five Diamond Award awards diamonds instead of stars, while Forbes sticks to stars to distinguish top hotels from lesser gods. Switzerland has both Hotelleriesuisse and GastroSuisse, while Canada does it with Canada Select and BC Hotel Association. We haven’t even mentioned TripAdvisor or Expedia, which have their own star ratings (which are of course based on user experiences and can therefore fluctuate enormously, even from one day to the next).
In Europe there is at least HOTREC that tries to shed some light on the chaos. The goal of HOTREC is to standardize the classification of hotels in 20 countries and so far 15 countries have committed to use (almost) identical criteria for classifying hotels.
Focus on the stars
This attempt at a little uniformity is pretty good, because if you don’t, there will be some kind of sprawl of stars. In some cases it is already too late because certain chic hotels in Mauritius claim to have 6 stars, the Burj Al Arab in Dubai has earned itself the predicate of 7-star hotel and there are rumors that somewhere in the Middle East there is a 10 star hotel is under construction. There is one officially recognized 7-star hotel: the Hotel TownHouse Galleria Milano in Milan, Italy. For those 7 stars, the hotel only offers 7 suites, the penthouse of which costs a whopping € 15,000 – per night. A bargain considering that the room comes with its own personal chef and butler.
Burj Al Arab Jumeirah, © Leonardo
Hotel TownHouse Galleria Milano, © Leonardo
For a much more reasonable 5-star rating, the top hotels in Spain only need to have the following facilities: at least a bathroom (bath and shower), telephone in the room, central heating, air conditioning in the room, lift, bar, safe in the room. the room.” At VisitEngland, they keep it simple (and oh so terribly British) with obligatory afternoon tea , while in France you can whistle for those 5-stars without an on-call massage service .
What can you do to get the hotel you want?
In addition to finding out more about the star ratings of hotels in any destination of yours, it’s best to check the hotel websites and review websites to see how guests have rated the hotel (it’s also recommended to check out our 5 exclusive tips for insiders to find the cheapest hotel room). You should take into account that a statement on TripAdvisor and similar websites, for example, can give a good impression of your hotel, but guest reviews mainly indicate what those reviewers themselves thought of the hotel and therefore do not describe the level of the hotel. the services provided by the hotel. Photos, on the other hand, are a completely different story. People may differ in opinion or taste, however photos show the true facts. It is very worthwhile to click through the photos of a guest, so that you can form your own judgment.
The bottom line is that you don’t have to shy away from booking a 4-star or even a 3-star stay, instead of that 5-star hotel you’ve set your sights on. Maybe you don’t have afternoon tea or your own butler, there will surely be plenty of things that will leave just such a nice memory.
